


Picking Up Pieces

by csi_sanders1129



Category: Burn Notice
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Community: hc_bingo, Fights, Grief/Mourning, Infidelity, M/M, Rough Sex, slightly AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-14
Updated: 2012-09-14
Packaged: 2017-11-14 05:00:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/511574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/csi_sanders1129/pseuds/csi_sanders1129
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Fiona is still in prison and Jesse is the one who ends up picking up the pieces for Michael in the aftermath of finally catching up to Anson - if in unexpected ways.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Picking Up Pieces

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kittycrackers (Calacious)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/gifts).



> Contains mentions of canonical character death (read: spoilers for season 6), infidelity, rough sex (which I have never written before), and lots of angst. Written in response to hc_bingo prompt: grief and cottoncandy_bingo prompt: sex and you can pretty much do the math from there. Characters not mine, please enjoy! Comments are awesome.

It's the night after Nate is killed and Michael is on his fifth beer when Jesse seems to magically appear in front of him. Jesse, in fact, did not magically appear, but instead took the time to knock on the door, walk in, and slowly approach a clearly very despondent sort of ex-burned spy with all sorts of fair warning, all of which he apparently managed to miss in his present state of totally out of it. Actually, it's not until Jesse is prying the empty Corona bottle out of an unresponsive Michael's hands that he seems to notice the intrusion, bouncing back into violently defensive spy reflexes that have him on his feet (slightly unsteady as they may be) and lunging at Jesse, getting his hands solidly around Jesse's neck in seconds flat.

"Hey," Jesse chokes out at him, clutching at Michael's hands as they tighten on his neck. "Hey, stop."

But he isn't listening. His eyes are a sort of glazed over blank that does not suggest much by way of his current mental status and Jesse sees this and realizes he needs to act fast because Michael is not messing around here. He uses his own training to fight back, getting his hands around Michael's forearms and pushing in on specific pressure points in his wrists to break the hold is friend has on him. And while this does get the hands off his neck, now he has Michael throwing punches to deal with.

"Michael," he coughs out, dodging a blow that probably would've broken a few ribs had it landed. "Mike, stop, it's me. I'm just trying to help, okay?" Blow after blow rains down on him, and he does manage to avoid most of them, but some of them hit with considerable force. And he's trying not to fight back (Mike's dealt with enough today, he doesn't need to add battle wounds to the mix), but he's not being given much of a choice in the matter when Michael manages to get a hold of his arm and twist it behind his back. "Dude, come on. Listen to me!" He's shouting now and he retaliates by stomping down on Michael's foot because _ow._

Michael stumbles backwards when he recoils, crashing into the workbench against the wall and knocking nearly everything off of it in the process. Released in the chaos, Jesse pulls free and tries to get clear, but the fights not over yet, apparently, because the other man is back on his feet and stalking forward again in the time it takes Jesse to get to the other side of the room.

This punch hits the hardest, landing solidly on Jesse's face. It doesn't break the skin, but it hurts like hell and it's going to bruise like crazy, Jesse's pretty sure, and now he's swinging back in his own defense. Michael's inebriation proves helpful in this, making it a little harder for him to dodge the punch Jesse aims at his own face, a move that effectively bloodies his lip and has him spitting a mouthful of blood before he's after Jesse once again.

"Fuck," Jesse growls out, when nails rake at his arm, trying to get a firm grip, and they leave bloody gashes in their wake. He catches Michael's arm before it can do any more damage and he holds tight.

Things get even crazier from there when Michael pulls a gun from somewhere and okay, this is worse than Jesse thought.

"Mike," he says, his voice slow and steady as he tries to figure out a way to disarm him, frozen where he stands. "Mike, you don't need to do this. You know me." He spots one of the empty beer bottles on the counter to his right and before Michael can aim and shoot, he grabs it up and smashes the glass over Michael's arm. The gun drops and Michael's bleeding from where the glass shattered, but he has no doubt that this has also served to make him madder.

Jesse acts to preempt any further attacks by moving first (and also hoping Mike isn't concealing any more weapons on his person), using the hold he still has on his arm to pull him away from the gun. He manages to kick it under the counter when he steps after Michael, getting up enough momentum to get Michael against the nearest wall. He catches hold of Michael's other arm and gets them both pinned over his head. Using his own weight to keep him in place, he determines to wait out the struggling until his friend snaps back to reality.

"Look," he says, dodging back when Michael tries to headbutt him when he leans in too close. "Look. I know, I know that this sucks. I can't even imagine how it feels for you to lose Nate. I have no idea and I'm sorry, but this won't bring him back. And I know it sucks that Fiona's still trapped in jail for a few more days, until they get all this stuff with Anson worked out, and I know that you need her right now, to deal with everything, but you can't spiral like this. It's not helping anything." The squirming has stopped, and the crazy-eyed look replaced with icy glaring, which is a good thing considering the alternative. "She can't be here, but I can. So. If... if you need anything, just tell me and I'll..."

The sentence dies off because Michael surges forward again, this time sealing his lips over Jesse's in a completely unexpected move that effectively stuns Jesse into silence. The kiss is bruising, rough and forceful in a way that Jesse can't say he'd be surprised by if he'd thought of kissing Michael prior to right this second and yet he finds himself giving as good as he gets, sucking Michael's lip into his mouth and laving over it with his tongue. The metallic tang of blood from Michael's busted lip hits him and he's about to pull back and apologize, but Michael doesn't even seem to notice it, too occupied with forcing his own tongue into Jesse's mouth.

He still has Michael's hands pinned overhead and he makes the risky decision to release them, hoping this wasn't just some ploy to get him to drop his guard so that crazy-Michael can attack him again. It isn't. At least not in the way Jesse was fearing. The second his hands are free, Mike goes straight for his shirt, sliding under the thin material to get at bare skin where blunt nails drag down slowly down his ribs.

Jesse shivers in response to that, and he bites down with considerable force on Michael's lip when he catches it between his teeth, which earns him a groan from Michael.

And it's Michael who ends up breaking the kiss, but both of them are breathing hard with first the fight and then the kissing and Jesse thinks that maybe he's finally come back to his senses and realized what he was doing, but no. No, that's not it. Now he's moving to suck at Jesse's neck, and not being particularly gentle with his teeth, either and this is all going to leave marks and okay, what the hell?

"Mike," Jesse says, getting a grip on Michael's hair and pulling him up because it's the only way he can think of to get him to stop when words haven't really worked thus far. It works, and the confused look he's giving Jesse is almost enough to make him give up on his question. Almost. "Mike, what're you doing?"

"Can we just..." Michael starts, the first words he's said since Jesse showed up. "I need to not feel for a while."

And Jesse seems to get that he means that he doesn't want to think about Nate or Fiona or the clusterfuck that his life has become since he was burned, and, well. He can do that, he thinks. He told Mike he'd be here to help and it's not exactly what he expected, but...

"Okay," he agrees. "Okay." And then he's diving back into their kiss, steps the biting and the roughness up a bit because he's starting to think that that's what Mike wants - to feel something other than loss right now. For the physical to overrule the emotion and Jesse can totally get why he'd want that. So he backs away long enough to pull Michael's shirt over his head, a move which he seems amenable to given his cooperation in the task. A thin sheen of sweat coats his chest and he can feel Michael's heart jack-hammering against the hand that he settles there, while his other reclaims its grip on Michael's hair. He pulls lightly, and Mike tilts his head back with a pleased groan, exposing his long neck to Jesse.

The first thing he can think of to do is to return the favor for the marks that sting on his neck with every move he makes. He's gentle at first, something this whole encounter hasn't really been at all, so it seems to throw Michael a bit when Jesse's just kissing his neck lightly, but apparently Jesse is running this show, so Michael will just have to wait while Jesse enjoys the moment. "Jess," Michael mumbles, sounding just a little bit desperate, "come on." And Jesse gives in, letting his teeth close down on the juncture of neck and shoulder. It's not enough to draw blood, he doesn't bite hard enough for that, but it is apparently enough to make Michael's hips roll against his own, and he finds Michael rock hard already when he slips one of his legs between Michael's thighs. He does the same to the other side of Mike's neck and then sucks at his Adam's apple, dragging his teeth lightly over that as he lets one of his hands wander down to undo his belt and jeans.

"Come on, come on, come on," Mike keeps mumbling, though Jesse isn't actually sure what it is he wants. He's satisfied with his array of markings on Michael's neck, but now what? The bruises on his own neck start to ache, but not the ones from Michael's biting kisses. From earlier. From when Michael tried to attack him and, okay, yeah. That could work. If he wants this rough, then...

He lets his hands slide slowly up Mike's bare chest, tracing over a plethora of old scars - most of which Jesse doesn't know the story behind - and some new ones, too - like the one Jesse put there when he shot through Michael's shoulder to get at the guy about to kill him. He drags his thumb over a nipple and Michael's breath hitches for a second and he'll have to remember that for later. Right now, he has other ideas. He curls one hand around Michael's throat, barely touching, letting his fingers move over soft skin, but slowly he tightens his hold.

"What-" Michael gets out, before the hold is too tight for him to talk. His eyes are wide and he looks like he's about to fight back, a hand coming up to curl around Jesse's bicep, and that's when Jesse lets him go. He does it again, just for a few seconds and Michael seems to get it then, squeezing at Jesse's arm when he wants him to stop. Jesse takes a moment to shove Michael's jeans and boxers down his hips a little, enough to get at him without restricting clothing in the way. "Fuck," Michael groans, arching into his hand the second he makes contact and that seems to work pretty well as a distraction when Jesse closes his hand around Michael's neck again. He holds longer this time, doesn't let up until he feels Michael's nails biting into his arm. He waits a few seconds, dragging his hand up and down Michael's cock, before he tightens his hold again. Michael warns him off again and this time he's done with the game. He releases his hold on Michael and takes a half-step backward, leaving Michael so so so close to the edge that the noise he makes when he realizes Jesse's stopped almost sounds like begging. "Puh- Why did you...?"

"Hold on," Jesse says. "Do you want... If, if this goes further. Do you have anything we can use?"

"Drawer next to the bed," Michael tells him (also confirming that he wouldn't be opposed to this going further). "Should be stuff there."

Jesse quickly retrieves the items, a condom and a bottle of lube. Michael seems to take the time to regain some control over himself because he looks a little less desperate when Jesse gets back to him, even if he's still breathing like he's recently finished running a marathon.

"Shouldn't you be losing some clothes here, too?" Michael asks, eyeing Jesse's fully clothed form.

"I could do that, yeah," Jesse agrees, pulling his own shirt over his head and Mike's hands land on him before it's even totally off, this time surprisingly gentle in comparison to his earlier bitey-scratchiness as his fingers move over well-toned muscles and smooth skin. He lets Michael do what he wants for a few minutes, but when hands start to work at his jeans he catches Michael's hands again because this isn't really about him at all. "Turn around," Jesse orders, pulling at Michael's shoulder until he complies and spins to face the wall, looking back at Jesse curiously.

He's not sure if Mike's ever actually done this before - he has a little bit of college experimentation on his side, thanks to a very, very convincing roommate - but then he's not exactly the type to jump into anything without knowing what he's doing. "If you want me to stop, just say so," Jesse tells him anyway.

Michael nods and braces himself against the wall, hips rocking into Jesse's touch when he shoves his jeans down farther. "Just do something," Michael says, growling in frustration when Jesse's hands disappear again. "Come on."

"Easy," Jesse counters, using the lube to slick up his fingers. "I'm getting there." He leans forward enough to bite down on the back of Michael's neck and he reaches around to lightly pinch and tease at Michael's nipples, recalling his earlier reactions. Mike makes an indescribable sort of "Nnfff...," noise that tells Jesse his distractions are proving effective and he takes that as an opportunity to slip a finger inside of him.

He hisses in pain at first, because, yeah, that part kind of sucks, but rough is what Michael wanted when this started, so Jesse doesn't wait as long as he probably should before he moves his finger, stretching to make room for more. He slides a second finger in just a moment later, coupled with a particularly rough bite just over the scar from Jesse's shot, and that combination earns him a mumbled curse from Michael.

"Enough," Michael's telling him just a few seconds later. But, yeah, totally not enough. Either he really has never done this before and doesn't know what he's doing or he has and he knows exactly what he's doing. And Jesse might've been down for everything else so far - even if he's never been this rough with anyone he's been with before and he's really just kind of winging all of this - but he's not doing this. "Come on," Mike pleads, "good enough."

"Dude, this is kinda the part that you generally don't want to hurt that much," Jesse counters, even as he adds a third finger and works as quickly as he can. "So just hold on a minute."

Michael pushes back against his fingers, impatient and demanding, but Jesse's pulling out just a second later, backing off to get himself ready. "Jess," he says, reaching back to try to pull Jesse back to him. "Please."

It only takes him a few seconds to get his own jeans out of the way, and just a few more to roll on the condom and slick himself - and, fuck, he's close. He hopes he can last a little while, here. Having this kind of control over Mike is really getting to him - with a generous amount of lube in an attempt to combat the rushed prep job. "Okay, okay. This... this is probably still going to hurt," he warns, lining himself up. He pushes Michael forward a little bit so he can support himself against the wall and he keeps one arm around the other man because he has a feeling that he has underestimated how much this is going to hurt at first. "Ready?"

"Been ready," Mike answers, so Jesse pushes in, and yeah, he totally called that. Michael's growling out a litany of curses, his body rigid and tense which isn't helping matters at all because it's exactly the opposite of what he needs to be doing. His hand lands on Jesse's arm and his nails are digging into his skin hard enough to draw blood, but Jesse keeps going until he's all the way in and then he waits.

It takes a few minutes - a few, long, hellish, torturous minutes of being surrounded by fantastically tight heat, on Jesse's part - of not moving at all for Michael to start relaxing. After that, Michael starts rocking back against him and from there, he dares to draw himself out a little before he pushes back in to meet one of Michael's rocking motions. The pace builds slowly, and Mike reaches down to give himself some relief now that he's not overwhelmed by pain, but Jesse sees this and moves to stop it because that's going to make this end even faster and he doesn't really want to be thinking that when it just started.

"Nope," he says, catching hold of Michael's wrist and pulling it over his head, glad for the three inches he has on the other man to give him just the smallest bit of a height advantage. Once that one is solidly pinned, he catches the other and keeps them both restrained there, like he was when this all started. "Not happening. No touching."

Michael turns his head to glare, getting out a breathless, "jackass," before Jesse captures his lips in a kiss. Despite the rough pace and rough words and rough hold, the kiss is on the nicer side, with a distinct lack of biting this time around.

"Yeah, try and tell me you don't like it," Jesse mumbles against his ear once the kiss ends. He lets his free hand, the one not keeping Michael's in place, drag down his chest, playing first with one nipple and then the other - gets a barely audible, "fuck, fuck, fuck," from Michael - and then drags his nails down his ribs in a mirror of what Michael did to him before. His fingers barely brush the length of his dick, and Mike bucks into his touch a little erratically in response, but then he ends up settling at the base for a few seconds, squeezing lightly to hold him off for a bit before he settles his hold on the solid point of his hip. His fingers dig in hard enough to leave bruises behind, but he uses that leverage to pull Michael back to him even harder and the angle changes just enough so that he finally ends up brushing over Michael's prostate on his way back in.

Mike rocks against him, forces out a rough, "again," amended by "close," when Jesse complies and then he comes without even being touched just a few strokes later, splattering white ribbons over his stomach and the wall just in front of him. His head hits the wall lightly, his breath heaving and his body still kind of shaking in the aftermath, and the fallout from that - muscles contracting, even tighter, even hotter all around him - sends Jesse over the edge just a few seconds later and it's all he can do to keep the both of them standing when it hits him. He drapes himself over Michael, forcing him a little closer to the wall as he tries to get himself back under control.

After a minute, Jesse slips out. He spins the other man back around and kisses him again, lazy and long and slow because this is almost over and he kind of doesn't want it to be. He didn't know he wanted this, had no idea at all that he wanted Michael of all people, but he... apparently does. But pretty soon he'll have Fiona back and he's pretty sure this will never happen again, so he'll take what he can get while he can get it.

"Jess," Mike's mumbling against his lip, hands wandering aimlessly over his chest. "Bed?"

"Bed, okay," Jesse agrees, "yeah." He's not sure how he's going to muster up the will to cross the entirety of the room, or if he actually wants to ruin the bed since they're both bleeding from more than one injury gained in this adventure, but he doesn't have a lot of options. 'Screw it,' he thinks, 'I'll replace the sheets if I have to,' and helps Michael toward the bed, lets him sprawl himself out across it. He doesn't join him, though, even though he wants to and even though Mike's reaching out for him, trying to find purchase on an otherwise empty bed. He falls asleep before Jesse can talk himself into joining anyway, which is good. Good.

Because no, he's not staying. At least no longer than it takes to fix things up a bit. He starts with himself because that's easy. Trashes the condom, cleans himself up, fixes his jeans, and spends a good five minutes trying to figure out where the hell his shirt got to in the chaos. He moves on to Michael, wiping away the drying traces of their previous activities and readjusting Michael's jeans. He grabs the first-aid kit from the floor (though it is typically stowed on the workbench that Michael slammed into earlier) and does some quick patch work, mostly on the wound on his arm from the broken bottle. There's not much he can do for the bruises, the bites, or the busted lip but let them be, so he pulls the blankets over Michael and sets about his last task. He cleans up the glass shards and the rest of Mike's empty beer bottles and puts the gun away; he picks up what all was knocked on the floor during their fight, and wipes down the wall where he had Michael pinned.

And then, he leaves.

He leaves.

He leaves and by the time he gets home (he isn't sure how he managed that: doesn't actually remember driving or walking up to his door and he definitely didn't secure the place like his training demands) he's kind of freaking out. Between the fresh air and the chance to think, he's come to his senses and holy shit, he and Michael just had sex. He and Michael just had sex and Michael was drunk and lost and grieving (and he is also still involved with Fiona, who can probably kill him in her sleep) and that was quite possibly the stupidest thing he's ever done.

And it's not even like they could hide it. Even though he inadvertently cleaned up most of the evidence, there are marks and wounds and bruises that aren't going to fade all that quickly. Someone will notice. Fi when she gets out, Sam before then, if he gets a look at any of the injuries.

Speaking of injuries, he forces himself into a long, hot shower and then takes care to clean the ones he received, mostly courtesy of Michael's deceptively sharp nails. He wants to sleep, should sleep after the long day that spiraled out of control and took an unexpected turn into even more chaotic territory before crashing headlong into full on crazy, but he can't. So he grabs a few beers out of his own refrigerator and starts drinking and hopes that in the morning maybe everything won't be as epically fucked as he thinks it's going to be.

* * *

All too soon, his phone is ringing. It's too loud and too early and his brain is trying to pound its way out of his skull, but he sees Sam's number on his call display and he forces himself to answer.

"Yeah?"

" _Have you checked on Mike?_ "

"No," he lies. "Why?"

" _Can you?_ " He asks, " _I'm attempting to check on Maddie, but that's... not going well. She slammed the door in my face before I could say anything. Can't say I blame her._ "

"Sure," Jesse answers, even though he isn't sure that he wants to go back to Michael's just yet. "But maybe she just needs some time, Sam. Will pushing things help?"

" _I don't know, but I'm gonna stick around a little longer just in case_."

With that, the call ends, and Jesse forces himself to sit up and okay, yeah, he's kind of sore in ways he hasn't been in a while and sleeping on the couch probably hadn't helped much. He force-marches himself through his morning routine (and he's just covered in colorful bruises, most notably the one that spans half his face from the punch Michael landed) and then through his hangover cure routine and then out the door.

He prolongs the trip to the loft by stopping for gas, and then to call Pearce and see if anyone's gotten any leads on Nate's killer (the answer is no), and then to pick up breakfast, hoping coffee and doughnuts (for him) and blueberry yoghurt (for Mike) might ease things along a little.

With all of this delaying, he's more than a little surprised to find Michael still asleep when he lets himself into the loft (as risky as that has proven to be) and that makes him kind of more than glad that Sam didn't decide to bail on Madeline and check on Mike. He must've gotten up at some point, though, because he's showered and changed (still shirtless, but wearing grey sweatpants) and his wounds are bandaged a little less sloppily than Jesse had managed last night.

He takes the time to look Mike over, finding him just as thoroughly bruised as he is - swollen lip, crazy huge bruise on his back (probably from the workbench), the edges of finger-shaped bruises on his hip. Jesse's never seen him like this, asleep and vulnerable (though a compelling case could be made for the latter last night), but even still he looks tense, and Jesse suspects his hand is curled around a gun where it sits under the spare pillow.

"Mike," he says, quiet and slow, dropping the grocery bag on the kitchen counter and depositing the two coffees he's been precariously balancing beside it. He doubles back to shut the door he couldn't manage to close with his hands full, but he can see Michael's blue eyes tracking his movement as he approaches the bed. "You're awake."

"Yeah," he answers, though he makes no move to get out of bed.

"I, ugh, I brought breakfast. But it can wait." Jesse sits down on the edge of the bed, glad to note that there doesn't seem to be any blood visible on it from the array of unbandaged injuries Mike had when he landed on it. "How are you holding up?"

He means emotionally, but Michael's response is "feels like you hit me with a truck."

"Not what I meant, but technically, I think that the workbench is causing most of your pain. And your own impatience."

"And apparently my fist is causing most of yours," Mike comments, reaching out to tough the edges of the bruise on Jesse's face, and he finds himself kind of instinctually leaning into that touch. "That's worse than I expected."

"How much do you even remember?"

"Pretty much everything. I've got bits and pieces of the fighting, and I don't remember how that started, but, ugh, everything else, I remember," he explains. "I wasn't drunk, not really. Those beers spanned a good five hours. I was just... really out of my head when you showed up, I guess."

Jesse sighs in relief, "good to know. That you weren't drunk, I mean." There's still the grief part of the took-advantage-of-Michael equation, but at least he wasn't drunk out of his skull. "And, ugh, that... that not feeling thing. How'd that work out?"

Mike shrugs, drops his hand. "I could sleep without seeing it. Every time I'd close my eyes before, it was just on repeat, but after... just nothing. So, thanks for that."

"And now?"

"Back again," he admits, staring intently up at the ceiling as if completely opposed to the idea of shutting his eyes.

Jesse has no idea why he's digging himself in deeper. Fiona may not be out yet, but she will be and he has no idea how this... this thing with Mike will play into that at all, but at the moment, he doesn't care. She's not here and he is and Mike needs someone around right now. "Tell me something about him," he asks, because he hadn't been around Nate that much. Not like Fi and Sam had been. He doesn't know if this is the right move, but ignore it won't help, either.

And, surprisingly, Michael does. He tells Jesse stories about when they were little. When Nate was six and he was eleven and Madeline had taken them to the beach when their father was out of town. When Nate was nine and tried to stand up to their Dad when Michael had nearly been caught with a stolen car. When Nate was twelve and always tagging after he and Andre and Ricky. He keeps going, updating Jesse on the clients Nate's helped with since Michael returned to Miami, up the most recent ones that Jesse was around for. Then it's how he hates that one of the last things he said to his brother involved lots of shouting, involved calling him a liability to the case, telling him to leave and get the hell away before he messed everything up even more. And he hates that he can never change that. And that he hates that his mom had to lose Nate because of him.

Somewhere in this process, Jesse ends up lying down next to him, and the stories are interspersed with slow, biting kisses that distract Michael for minutes at a time, usually put into action when it looks like he's getting a little too stuck in his own head.

"We'll catch him," Jesse says quietly, when Mike has actually managed to talk himself back to sleep some hours later. Michael's stories, while apparently cathartic for the man himself, only serve to make Jesse regret not knowing Nate better - he seemed like a good guy, always trying to help even if he sometimes went about it in the wrong way. But Nate is gone and Michael is even more broken than he already was, but Jesse can maybe sort of help fix him, just a little. He might not have a lot of time to do that, but he's going to try as long as he's allowed to do so. So, he settles a hand on the outline of the bruise he left on Michael's hip, curls in close against his back and lets himself drift off, too.

Because maybe things can be a little bit better (not okay, probably never okay) when Michael wakes up.


End file.
